Revolution #171, August 2, 2009
Correspondence from a reader:
On July 4th, we held a “Stop Thinking Like Americans and Start Thinking About Humanity” picnic in a downtown park. People donated all kinds of food and drinks. A trio performed their upbeat music to kick it off. We started off with about 15 people and that grew as people from the park came to check it out. There were communists, Revolution readers, youth, activists and proletarians. We raised $120 and have $80 more coming in pledges.
There were many good things that happened at the picnic– more people getting to know one another and appreciating one another politically and personally, including older people learning new things about youth culture. There was a lot of lively debating like on the role of religion among the Black masses and why we need communist revolution – not the Obama “revolution.” People were drawn to a huge display of issues of Revolution and some took papers to get out to their friends. This all came together at the end when we challenged people around getting down with the party and taking out the newspaper and fundraising to others.
To imagine a world without America was very challenging. One guy said that he couldn't because he sees the American people as part of America and he couldn't imagine a world without people. However, it was brought up to him that Americans aren't the only people and so he should stop thinking like an American and start thinking about humanity. This caused him to pause and think. Some of the people who showed up could see that just because Obama was the president, it didn't negate the fact that there was still a system in place holding people down. It was important to not just present Revolution Newspaper to them, but to invite them to discussions and to get with the revolution.
One guy in particular, though, was very adamantly opposed to what we were bringing forward.
He at first believed that if you just had enough education then you could make it in this society, like Obama. He said that Obama should be given time to change things. He put forth that people who are homeless choose to be that way. He said that he couldn't follow what we were doing because we didn't believe in god. He kept putting forth what the people who uphold this system propagate everyday, things that actually counter this man's, and the majority of people's interests and we told him that too. It was important to challenge him though on what he kept throwing up because we were able to get into what he really believed and that was that he didn't think that the world could be changed at all. We believe otherwise, and told him that because of Bob Avakian and the work he has done studying the past communist projects and not just learning from but synthesizing how we can do better next time, we can actually change the world. He folded up his copy of the newspaper and said he would check it out.
This picnic provided an opportunity to bring together people who don’t normally have a chance to discuss these kinds of questions about the world we live in and whether another world is possible. One guy in particular has a job in which he travels and can see first hand what happens when the government sets up shop. He talked about the poverty and the shanty towns he's seen and now he was challenged to take Revolution with him because there is an answer to the horrors of this system.
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